Many recreational vehicles (RV) have walls that include various features or structures such as windows, doors, slide-rooms, vents, televisions, etc. In a conventional RV wall construction, a wall blank is first produced by constructing a frame from materials such as aluminum, wood, steel, etc., and filling the frame with insulation (e.g., foam, fiberglass batting, etc.) to form a structural wall. An interior laminate (e.g., wood paneling, fiberglass, etc.) is affixed to one side of the structural wall to form the interior side of the wall blank, and an exterior laminate (e.g., fiberglass, aluminum, steel, etc.) is affixed to the other side of the structural wall to form the exterior side of the wall blank. Often, additional materials such as wood paneling, Coremat®, or fiberglass will be included to stiffen the laminates, add thickness, and/or prevent the frame of the structural wall from “printing through” onto the laminate surface. The areas that are to receive features are then cut out of the wall blank, and the cut pieces of the wall blank are either incorporated into other portions of the RV or discarded.
The rough-cut openings in the wall blank must then be finished with an additional molding or covering before the respective features can be installed. Typically, this molding is specially-made from materials such as aluminum, plastic, and/or composite materials. This process results in increased material and labor costs, and waste of expensive materials. Accordingly, improvements to the fabrication of RV walls are desirable.